Southern California -- this just in

El Monte officials vote to rehire 'Gangnam' video lifeguards

October 17, 2012 | 6:14
am

A divided El Monte City Council voted to return 14 city
lifeguards to the jobs they lost last month after shooting a video spoof using
the city pool and wearing city-issued uniforms without permission, the San
Gabriel Valley Tribune reported.

The
council voted 3-2 to approve Mayor Andre Quintero's recommendation to direct
the interim city manager, Dayle Keller, to rehire the lifeguards, the Tribune reported.

Joining
Quintero were council members Bart Patel and Norma Macias. Voting against were
Victoria Martinez and Juventino Gomez, the newspaper reported.

Quintero
has said that if the fired workers were rehired, they would be more likely to cooperate with an independent review into several accusations that have been made about the management of the city's Aquatic
Center.

The
lifeguards -- 13 college-age students and their manager -- parodied "Gangnam
Style," a South Korean pop video that has drawn nearly 360 million views on the
Internet, becoming the most-liked song on YouTube. They were fired in September
after their video, called "Lifeguard Style," surfaced on the
Internet.

The
lifeguards drew local and global support through their Facebook page, with more
than 17,000 fans. Nearly 300 people packed a council meeting earlier this month, demanding
that the guards be rehired.

At that meeting, Quintero said Keller has hired a contractor
to review the steps leading to their termination "and as we do the
investigation, we need them to cooperate" but that the lifeguards "can't
do that if they're not employed."

"This
is more than just about a video," he said, noting the need for a
"deeper look at the management" of the aquatic center.

The
mayor said he wondered "how can 14 people put together a video and no one
from management knew what was going on?"